Scrolling Notification

Tuesday, 28 September 2010

A R Rahman
who took six months and Rs 5,00,00,000 to compose a theme song for the
Commonwealth Games is said to have ‘tweaked’ his original version.

Some
say, he has made the song more peppy by adding instrumental music. Some others say the song has a sharp beat
now, fewer words and more music. And the
‘enlightened’ ones say, ‘Rahman has added more layers to the song giving it a folk
touch’!

‘Oh Yaaro, Ye India Bula Liya’ was first
composed, sung and recorded by Rahman on 11 September. Expectations were that it would ‘outshine’
the FIFA World Cup theme song ‘Waka waka’.
But Rahman failed to impress. Although
he was reported to have initially turned down suggestions to review it, in the
face of mounting criticisms, he seems to have yielded.

In
this ‘Here We Go Round the Mulberry Bush’ game, there was one streak of
silver lining: Suresh Kalmadi, the
‘optimist’ of late, reposing faith in Rahman!

Friday, 24 September 2010

It was ‘fun’ to take in those teasing attires, swaying
hips, and dewy-eyed bellybuttons! The question-answer session was even
more hilarious! Many of the contestants parodied mouthful of impressive
sentences, little knowing its meaning or relevance. Here are two examples
from a pageant of the past that I remember:

Judge: ‘Can you tell us what is your best feature?’

Contestant: ‘There is one that I have at
home. It’s of the majestic Rice Terraces. I believe that tourism can be
uplifted by our nation by means of having a good feature. I believe that
tourism is the key to the future, second to the children of the world who are
our future which is why we have to lead the way for them. Thank you’!

Here is another one:

Judge: ‘What is your stand on pre-marital sex?’

Contestant: ‘Ladies and Gentlemen, I am grateful to the
honourable judge for asking me an intelligent question. I do not stand, I
kneel down and pray all the time. Thank you’!

Tuesday, 21 September 2010

Mani Shankar Iyer has a presence
no one can ignore or wish away. And he
compliments it more than adequately with his classic diatribes.

Just days before the curtains
went up on yet another scam involving the Commonwealth Games Mani said, “I will
be very unhappy, if the games are successful because then they will start
bringing Asian Games, Olympic Games and so on”.
Mani added, “Just imagine if we would have spent the `35,000 crore in
providing training to the children, we would have won medals in every
international sporting event”.

How true! Acerbic and abrasive he might sound, but look
at the reports of corruption unfolding.
At the rate at which newer and fresher scams surface, I fear the common
man will soon become insensitive to this, accepting corruption as a way of
life!

Don’t we need a few more Mani
Shankar Iyers to shock us out of this slumber?

When our Foreign Secretary
Nirupama Rao flew into Pakistan recently, among those present to receive her at
the airport was Afrasiab Mehdi Hashmi, a senior diplomat known for his uncanny
ability to read the faces of people.

Someone close to Hashmi was once
quoted as saying, “It becomes very difficult to hide one’s inner self in front
of him”. Hashmi is also said to possess
a strange skill in predicting the immediate future. According to one story, during a foreign
office briefing on an upcoming visit by Zia to the UN General Assembly in 1988,
Hashmi happened to remark, “He won’t come”.
When asked why, he refused to speak further. The next day, Zia was killed in a plane
crash.

Physiognomy or Face Reading was
prevalent in ancient Greece, but was abandoned later as a questionable
science. Pakistanis seem to be
resurrecting it and gaining an edge over India in bilateral talks. Remember, Pervez Musharraf’s visit to India
in 2001, and how his breakfast meeting with journalists was ‘stealthily’ uploaded
to Pakistani channels, leaving us red in the face! And more recently, I wonder, if
Hashmi was around to read S M Krishna’s face!

As a fish eater, I am cornered!
The collision between two ships in the Arabian Sea is beginning to impact
marine life all along the Mumbai coast in a big way. Over 500 tons of fuel spilled out into the
sea. Of the several containers on board,
200 are reported to be empty and 11 are still missing.

Within days of the disaster,
nearly 500 kilograms of fish samples were found to be contaminated. BMC has promptly and rightly warned people to
avoid eating fish.

Toxicologists say that contamination
of this sort affects the fish in two ways.
In one, they are killed immediately, whereas in the other, death graces
them gradually. It is the second type
with its residual presence of Hydrocarbons that poses the biggest health
hazard.

According to experts, the spill
will have an amplified impact on the lobsters, crabs, shrimps etc., and the
real outcome will be known only by end of the year.

With a sigh let me say, “I’m in the mood for
fish, but I don’t want anything that tastes fishy”!

I hold no brief for Shashi Tharoor. Yet, to those who say his days are over, let me tell, “No. Before you finish saying ‘Lalit Modi’, he will be back”!

To make that prediction, I need not be a political pundit or an astrologer. Shashi lost his place in the ministry for no real reason. He did not try to ‘bribe’ an entry into IPL either for himself or his friend. As a first time junior minister, neither did he have the clout to demand an extra favour.

Days after he bowed out, two more senior politicians made their appearance in the IPL mega serial. But the so-called ‘political compulsions of the coalition mechanism’ restricted them to mere ‘guest roles’! Thanks to this hypocritical privilege! While it kept in chair the ‘king’ of all scandals, it wasn't applicable’ in the case of Shashi!

From day one, Shashi was seen as a strange creature in the Indian political jungle. He looked different; talked different, and kept company with stranger creatures! No politician, either at the state or national level seemed comfortable having him around. I only have two questions for the Shashi baiters:

At a time when India is struggling to manage its growing global presence, should we waste a storehouse of talents in international politics and diplomacy?

And where is the state of Kerala, crying of perpetual neglect since 1956, going to find a representative of Shashi’s stature and calibre to articulate its requirements in New Delhi?

Even cold-blooded killings need
to be categorised differently now-a-days. Each category seeks to justify
its actions and gain a legitimacy that simply does not exist. As
‘Political Killings’ continue unabated, the latest to hit the front page is the
‘Honour Killing’.

An ‘honour killing’ involves the
murder of a member of a family or community, where the victim is perceived to
have brought dishonour to the family or community. This normally arises
out of choosing to marry within the same gotra, engaging in adultery
etc. The murderers believe that the killing, which has the sanction of the
community, is an honourable act!

Khap Panchayats were originally
formed to settle disputes and promote brotherhood among the different
communities. However, over a period, they became a collection of
self-appointed guardians of the ‘honour’ of their community. They claim
that marriages between persons belonging to the same gotra are
incestuous and hence cannot be permitted. At the same time, they
adamantly oppose inter-caste marriages for fear of losing a rare booty - the
caste divisions in the society!

As innocent lives continue to be
sacrificed on the altar of ‘perverted’ honour, I wonder, ‘Is India really
marching ahead to be numero uno in the world?’

Cardinal Sins or the Seven Deadly Sins, since time immemorial were considered objectionable attributes to sinful behaviour and unhappiness. These sins were also believed to be the real cause of separation from God.

Dante Alighieri (1265 - 1321) the Italian poet, in his 'Divine Comedy' referred to them as 'offences of love for earthly goods'. He proposed three categories - Perverted Love (Pride, Envy and Wrath), Insufficient Love (Sloth), and Excessive Love (Greed, Gluttony and Lust).

Hindu scriptures, the fountainhead of universal wisdom exhort that man can attain enlightenment only when he sheds sixteen bad qualities, namely the six internal enemies (ari-shad-varga), eight forms of pride (ashta­-mada) and the twin qualities of restlessness and inertia (rajas-tamo-guna).

If you feel relieved, the survey which covered 35 countries, left India out of its purview, you sure are not alone!

When Thomas Mann got the Nobel
Prize in 1929 for his novel ‘Buddenbrooks’ he was just twenty-five. A
prolific writer, Mann is respected and often referred to for his symbolic and
ironic insight into the aspects of time and its influence on our lives.

"Time has no divisions to
mark its passage", wrote Mann in his novel ‘The Magic Mountain'. There is
never a thunderstorm or blare of trumpets to announce the beginning of a new
month or year ... It is only we, the mortals who ring bells and fire off
pistols". How true!

In ‘The Beloved Returns' another
novel, he wrote, "Hold fast the time! Guard it; watch over it, every hour,
every minute! It slips away like a lizard ...”

Twenty years later, stressing
the urgency of time, Jawaharlal Nehru said, 'Everything else can wait, but not
agriculture!'

It was clarion call to young
scientists. They proved, all it takes for fantasy to turn into reality,
was a matter of time, inspiration, and drive!

'Living beyond one's means' is the fad of the
day, adding a hideous dimension to the commodity 'money'. The urge to amass it, as much as one can
and as quickly as possible seems to be the only mission in life. And the logic seems to be, 'so long as the ends
justify, why bother about the means?'

This is reflected in a survey on global
corruption, where India ranks 84 in a list of 180 countries. Bribery in politics and business, and its disastrous impact on public trust and economic growth are the main basis for these findings.Ironically, another survey, ranked the Tata
Group as the most reputable business concern in the world. After 140 years of
existence, five generations of management, and two known instances of political sabotoge of its dream projects, the Tatas continues to be India's 'corporate
flagship'.

There is much to learn and emulate from this inspiring saga. As scams and scandals rock this nation, Tatas lends a significant contribution to the business of nation building.

Richard Nixon, the 37th President of the US, and Henry
Kissinger, his National Security Advisor and Secretary of State are two
Americans we remember for the wrong reasons. At the height of India's
war with Pakistan in 1971,
the duo ordered the Seventh Fleet into the Bay of Bengal in a crass attempt at
threatening India.
The mighty armada entered the bay on
December 13th. But it stayed
'an­chored' for the next three days, meekly watching the ongo­ing war reach its
logical conclusion where over 90,000 Pakistani soldiers laid down arms before
the Indian Army.

Kissinger was busy dreaming up a 'new world
order' at that time, aimed at expanding American hege­mony in the world. He would assert, "Control the oil and
we'll control the countries. Control
food and we'll control their population". Obsessed with this theory, the US turned to the Gulf, putting its foot in Kuwait, and later in Iraq. Had it not been for Iran, former ally turned foe, the US would have
been controlling 75% of the 'black gold' by now.

The Kissinger juggernaut never lost its momen­tum.
His 'Food for Peace' programme conceived
to appropriate the global food chain, re-emerged in the form of 'Genetic
Engineering'. It is said to have created
over 40 crop plants from Tomato to Potato with designer traits that no one
knows how the human body would take.

Alarmingly, India is about to throw open its
doors to this questionable technology. Dr
Erwin Chargaff, regarded as the father of Molecular Biology says, "I have
the awful feeling that sci­ence has transgressed a barrier that should have
remained inviolate. The genetic
engineering experi­ments are irreversible. You cannot recall a new form of
life. It will survive you, your
children, and your children's children."

I heard this anecdote from a doctor friend in the US. It was about a senior colleague, who had performed over 4000 heart surgeries at a phenomenal success rate of 98 %. Highly respected and sought after, he was a known atheist!

One day my friend asked him: "Agreed, you don't believe in God. But I'm sure you've seen that beautiful statue of Mother Mary just outside the main OT”. He nodded.

My friend continued: "On two occasions, when accompanying you to the OT, I noticed a strange thing. Was it accidental?"

"What?" the senior doctor asked.

With a smile, my friend told: "Well… You almost tripped when you reached the statue!"

The doctor thought for a while before replying: "You know the anxious moments in the OT. I am no different. As the surgery is over and the patient is brought off the bypass, I gaze at the heart, almost willing it to start. Until it settles down to a regular rhythm, I am desperate. I see all that I built up - my success, my reputation, respect - everything hanging precariously by a slender thread. And my mind involuntarily rushes to the spot, where you say I tripped".

Faith in God to some, is like that slender thread, unseen and unfelt; but rare moments in life help them discover it!

On Solar eclipse day, most of the temples
remained closed to block the ingress of negative energy. An atheist would have
loved to ask, 'If God were the creator and controller of all, why should he be
protected from a temporary celestial phenomenon?"

Hindu scriptures have the answer.

A temple is essentially manmade. The divine presence here is invoked by human
beings through mantras and rituals, and it manifests around the idol as an
aura. This energy is analogous to the
scent in flowers, butter in milk and fire in fuel. So ethereal is it, that gravita­tional
disturbances can have a debilitative effect. That is why Aagama saastraas ordain closure, protection, and ablution of
temples during occurrences like the eclipse, appearance of comets etc.

If planetary movements could impact such
sacred symbols, imagine what it could to do to mortals like us. Science may pooh-pooh this, even as it accepts
the lunar angle on tidal formations and lunacy. A free mind would however venture far beyond
this infantile vision, in search of knowledge, peace and hope.

History has its share of nightmares. When a case of Swine Flu was reported over a
month ago in Mexico,
the incident seemed too distant and diminutive to bother. But, when the virus landed in India, it was
time to sit up and take note. The fourth
pandemic of the century is regarded as deadlier than its Spanish ancestor who
claimed forty million lives, 90 years ago.

What is in the offing is a series of eclipses
- a rare celestial spectacle! Six of them - each one a triple 'sundae', are
lined up for the next ten years. The
Solar eclipse on 22nd July will be the longest in 2000 years. Its appearances in the last few millenniums,
witnessed the great Kurukshetra war, submergence of Dwaraka, the World Wars,
and the atomic bombing of Japan.

Two ominous events ... hopefully unrelated
and holding no more nightmares, let us pray!

A recent survey revealed a decline of 14
percent in the Reading
habits of adults in the West over the last twenty years. What was shocking was the average time of four
hours spent daily on surfing, gaming and watching television, as against a
meagre 14 minutes on Reading!

It was almost 300 years ago that Sir William
Curtis, Lord Mayor of London
uttered the 3 Rs - 'reading, 'riting and 'rithmetic', which came to reflect one's
ability to cope with life and the world at large. The Print media more than competently promoted
these skills, but could not measure up to the speed, access and diversity of
the Electronic media. The outcome of the survey may be a pointer to this.

The power of reading in our lives is so
impregnable, that reading as a meaningful activity can never fade away.

The chickens have come home to roost! Pakistan has
become a terrorists’ playground cheered by a crippling economy and a defunct
government, with an angry and confused population looking on.

Until recently, the Swat valley with its fertile
orchards, alpine ridges and silent streams was a popular weekend getaway. The
valley has been 'talibanised' now.

The Taliban have introduced the harshest laws
of Islamic justice, including public floggings and execution. They have wrested control of the local
government. They have seized Swat’s
emerald mines worth millions of dollars a year in gemstones. At barbershops, notices warning men not to
shave their beards can be seen. Women
cannot step out their homes unless accompanied by their husbands or male
blood-relatives’. Girls are ordered to
cover themselves from head to toe. ‘Suicide
schools’ are busy moulding a generation of radicals.

As the ‘terrorist bomb’ begins to tick; the world
is searching for a solution. Is there a
way to stop Pakistan
from breaking up? Can its fallout be contained?

Fudge was my favourite sweet for a long time. Filled with chocolate, sugar, cream, and
nuts, its taste was simply irresistible. One day, quite unexpectedly, Fudge introduced
me to an unsavoury flavour.

It happened in 2001. There was a huge political controversy following
the release of a video tape in a sting operation. The tape showed a politician accepting cash as
'illegal gratification' purportedly to render a service of questionable nature.

Cornered, he tried desperately to wriggle
out, first blaming his political rivals, and tater pleading with an innocence that
would put even a child to shame, that the tape was edited, dubbed, doctored,
interpolated, and ... then came the word that rudely shook me out of my sweet slumber
– ‘fudged!’ For the first time I realised
(after referring to the dictionary of course) that 'Fudge’ was more than a mere
sweet! It meant to falsify, fabricate, manipulate or cook (as in cooking up
facts and figures).

Almost ten years have passed. Fudge does not fascinate me any more. 'But it
continues to be an all time favourite with the politicians, for it helps them
to disown their words and deeds! Fudge enables
them to blame it on wrong reportage and fictitious conspiracies. When challenged with evidence, they could go
on an 'excavation spree' digging digressive parallels from the history. Finally, when everything fails, they can
resort to rhetoric beyond our common sense and comprehension.

With general elections round the corner, how many
more ‘fudges’ would we have to chew?

The bestseller, 'Is New York Burning?' tells
the story of terrorists threatening to explode an atomic bomb smuggled in to
the US from Pakistan. As tensions mount, the US President receives a word of advice from the
Israeli Prime Minister, "Tell them publicly that if that bomb explodes, Pakistan's Northwest
Frontier areas where these acts are coming from will disappear from the face of
the earth ... And if you don't have the guts, I will do it for you".

An imaginary situation; but a typically
realistic response! That is Israel - the
touchstone of pre-emptive decimation of enemies, and an inspiring symbol of
fortitude.

Look at India. We fought 4 wars over issues that still
remain unresolved. Our neighbours with
the exception of one or two are hostile or unfriendly. The long coastline and land borders are
susceptible to infiltration and inflow of explosives.

26/11 was a rude reminder of these
vulnerabilities. Two months have passed.
And we are still talking!

What are we hoping to achieve? That the world at large will do us a favour
by closing down the terrorist camps in Pakistan? That they will round up our 'most wanted
criminals' hiding there and hand them over to us?

Are we trying to secure the future of this
nation? Or are we prolonging the sixty two years of agony?